


while we live (let us live)

by figure8



Category: Original Work
Genre: Alternate Universe, Alternate Universe - Fraternity, F/M, Internalized Homophobia, JUST GUYS BEING DUDES (and rich), M/M, The Riot Club Alternate Universe We've All Been Waiting For, a Wild Porn appears, or maybe it was just me. it probably was just me, so much misinformation about Harvard. so much
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-11-21
Updated: 2015-11-21
Packaged: 2018-05-02 15:44:50
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,398
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5253905
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/figure8/pseuds/figure8
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>"You know what they say," his father jokes before giving him the keys to his new car. "Girls for now, girls for later."</p><p>Will looks down and swallows his shame.</p>
            </blockquote>





	while we live (let us live)

**Author's Note:**

> i can't believe i'm writing fic for this. my life is a mess. this fic is a mess. it turned out to be less of a trc au and more of a tale of the spoiled gay elite. woops.  
> not beta-ed at all because i couldn't wait and i needed to WASH THE SINS OFF ME. written at three in the morning so probably full of horrid typos. yikes 
> 
> i am very sorry and this is very trash and i hope blandine disowns me because i deserve it
> 
>  
> 
> [READ CROOKED!!!!!](https://t.co/mh7E52pj0D)

The day before he leaves for sophomore year, Will’s father sits him down and tells him about the Club. It’s not _exactly_ a secret, per se. Will knows his father was a member, he’s not stupid. They’re Becketts. His great-grandfather has given interviews where he let it “slip”, playfully winking at the journalists, neither confirming nor denying. His grandfather still wears a pin shaped like a pig’s head, always visible but never too obvious. His dad used to tell him college stories that could never have happened if he had been just a simple undergrad at Harvard, no matter how much money he had. So yeah, Will knows. It’s not news.

It still feels like a big fucking deal. And it is, really, because hearing about it so openly, cards on the table, can only mean one thing. He’s not a freshman anymore, which means he can be tapped. It’s funny how even while knowing every male Beckett since as far as they can go back has been a member of the Porc, Will never quite believed he would get in. It’s like St. Paul’s all over again—he’s there, he deserves to be there, everyone thinks he belongs, but Will doesn’t feel it, so none of it matters. He will always feel displaced.

But his father smiles and serves him more wine and leans in secretively and shares memories and anecdotes and for once in his life, Will thinks it might be worth it. So few people enter the Porcellian each year, it can’t be a crowd. Maybe breathing will get easier if he’s in a private dormitory, if he only has to roam a private dining hall. Maybe the Club is the best thing that will ever happen to him: people that already know what to expect, people that have to like him, because they’re just like him and they’re tied for life anyway.

 

//

 

Initiation—they don’t say hazing, it’s a forbidden word, but Will isn’t _stupid_ , goddamnit, why does everyone keep thinking that—is intense. He’s fairly certain he’s drank someone’s piss at some point during the first weekend. It’s ten days he can’t quite remember and at the same time he knows he will never forget. A blur of noise and alcohol and pain and an exhilarating joy, his ribs hurting from laughing too much and running until his calves are sore and burning. In the end, it’s a crazy, deviant-sounding voice whispering into his ear.

 

_Welcome to the Porcellian Club._

 

//

 

The first thing Will says to Artemis Takano is a vaguely less offending version of _But you’re not white._ It’s a testament to Artemis’ sense of humor that Will doesn’t get punched in the teeth. Or maybe it’s habit, which makes the whole thing a whole lot sadder.

 

It goes something like this: Artemis is lounging on one of the couches, debauchery personified, in ripped jeans and a white wife-beater with a cross on it, his long white fur coat at his feet. Everyone around is wearing a tux. He still looks like he owns the place and has more right than any other person to be sitting in this living room. Will allows himself the armchair facing him, and stares for too long. He then proceeds to stutter _I didn’t know we accepted people like you_ , to which Artemis replies _It’s fucking 2015, dude_.

 

Way, way later, Artemis will whisper in his ear that for a second he didn’t know which “like you” exactly Will was referring to.

 

//

 

Artemis Takano is beautiful. He’s all golden skin and toned muscle wrapped in a wicked sense of style, a rock star _in devenir_. He’s six months younger than Will but has been a member for a year already, because he skipped a grade back in elementary and is actually a junior. Which means he’s smart, which is not surprising because they’re all smart, somehow. But Artemis is fucking brilliant. His track record with school is a fucking nightmare for academic advisors—he only works when he cares, and he usually doesn’t need to work if he cares, so he just cruises through half his classes and fails the others. The Club has a policy about academic failure but no one utters a single word to Artemis Takano when he has to retake an entire semester. It’s almost as if they’re all just glad he’ll be there for three more months. Artemis Takano doesn’t give a shit. He’s not legacy. His mother is a self-made movie star from Latin America and his dad a Japanese immigrant. On quiet nights, he puts on films he played in as a child and everyone has a laugh. On even quieter nights, he puts on his mother’s movies and no one speaks for hours, mesmerized. Will watches all of them and wishes he could find Calypso Takano attractive. It never works.

 

//

 

His father offers him a Lamborghini for Christmas. During dinner, everyone asks way too many questions and Will almost chokes on a bite of roasted turkey. He stares at his fork and invents a girlfriend. He names her Alice like the girl Artemis is always with, and willfully ignores what it might mean. His dad asks if she’s new money and Will says she’s on scholarship because it means she can’t be looked up.

 

“It’s refreshing,” he says. “She’s nice.”

 

“You know what they say,” Frederick Beckett jokes before giving him the keys to his new car. “Girls for now, girls for later.”

 

Will looks down and swallows his shame.

 

//

 

They drink and drink and drink and complain about the world. Will grew up in New Hampshire, has always been surrounded by Boston Brahmins, but this is a whole other level. They drive around campus in his brand new convertible, six in a car that can only fit three, and Artemis stands up and yells and then throws up on the windshield and all over Will. They get into fights at bars, dressed down and anonymous, because some of them have anger inside their bodies that cannot be contained to fists. Will sees hundred dollar bills passed from hand to hand and used like handkerchiefs to clean up real and virtual messes.

 

“Poor people can’t understand shit,” Artemis says, and then he downs his seventh shot of vodka. It’s only eleven pm. Will tends to agree, but it’s distasteful to say so. “We want—we want to help them, you know? But they don’t want to be helped, they just want to be us.”

“My great-grandfather was vice-president,” Will says. “My father wants to run.” _My father wants me to run_ , he doesn’t say. A scandal away from disgrace, that’s what people in politics will always be. He hopes the message is clear, that Artemis will steer away.

“You’re fucking gorgeous,” Artemis says. Will doesn’t speak to him for days.

 

//

 

“Where did you meet Alice?” Will asks.

“We went to St. Mark’s together.” Artemis is smoking on his balcony, back pressed to the bannister. His hair isn’t styled or tied for once, and it brushes his bare shoulders with every nod of his head. Will has been carefully avoiding looking at his abs for ten minutes now. Artemis doesn’t jog like Will, he doesn’t really do any sports, but some-fucking-how, he still looks fucking photoshopped. He crushes his cigarette on the wall and flicks it away. Will thinks of it falling in the flowers and grimaces. “ _Dum vivimus vivamus_ ,” Artemis smiles.

Will frowns. “I’m sorry?”

“The motto of the club. _While we live, let us live._ ” It starts raining, small drops falling on Artemis’ face because he’s not entirely covered, leaning out like that. One line of water glides down his collarbone and something at the pit of Will’s guts constricts hungrily. “You should let yourself live, Will Beckett.”

 

//

 

Will kisses Artemis the second week of junior year, in their dorm’s hallway, Artemis against the wall with Will’s thigh between his legs, pressed to his crotch. Artemis arches up into him, fingers curling into Will’s soft merinos sweater, bringing their bodies even closer together. It’s a closemouthed kiss at first, but it’s firm and purposeful from the very beginning, Will pouring years of want and frustration into it. Then Artemis flicks his tongue against Will’s lower lip and oh. _Oh_. Will opens his mouth and lets him in, and Artemis tastes of whiskey and thyme, and he makes a small hurt noise when Will backs away to breathe. He feels mad, dizzy, and none of it stops him from diving back in, biting at Artemis’ jaw and licking his throat, Artemis moaning softly with his head thrown back and his dick unmistakably hard against Will’s leg.

 

“Fuck,” Will chuckles, and he sounds wrecked.

“Indeed,” Artemis replies, and Will knows he was going for cocky, but his voice is just as lost and bewildered as Will’s.

 

//

 

They get the entire club banned from the fanciest restaurant in Cambridge because Artemis and Will get caught fucking in the restrooms. Artemis laughs it off as if he wasn’t just discovered on his knees with a cock in his mouth. Will has seven panic attacks in four days.

 

//

 

“My father can’t know,” Will tells Artemis late at night the first time they sleep in the same bed. “No one can know. It would ruin us.”

“It’s fucking 2015,” Artemis snickers, and Will experiences a bitter sense of deja-vu.

“We’re republicans,” Will sighs. “This will destroy my father, Artemis. It cannot get out.”

Artemis’ smile is fond but patronizing. “Everyone at the Porc knows, Will.”

“I realize. But everything we do here is secret anyway. I’m not the first one to suck dick in this room, I’m sure. But it can’t get out.”

There is a peculiar sadness in Artemis’ irises when he asks, “Are you gonna stay in the closet your entire life?”

Will does not gratify him with an answer. It’s a goddamn fucking stupid kind of question anyway.

 

//

 

He goes back home for Thanksgiving and has to tell his parents he broke up with “Alice”. He’s tired of lying. He’s also tired of the truth.

 

//

 

There is something holy in the way Artemis looks at him when they’re naked and alone, with no barriers, not false pretenses. Artemis runs his fingers on the inside of Will’s arms and murmurs, _Let’s go to Japan next summer._ Will thinks of the Artemis Takano everyone gets to witness existing, wasted and gritty and dirty from the inside out, cuts and burns on his wrists and his knuckles, a cloud of smoke surrounding him wherever he goes. He thinks of the Artemis he knows best, the boy who kissed him under the rain one day after Will admitted he loved cliché romantic movies; who calls his mother once a week for four hours and tells her everything; who squeals with joy when he sees a small dog and runs away from cats because he’s allergic and also a giant drama queen. He thinks of the flicker of light in Artemis’ eyes when he gets to speak Spanish or Japanese or French, he thinks of Artemis too drunk to make choices lying down on the pavement, he thinks of the soft gaze he offers Alice when she does not see and of Artemis high on anger with blood on his hands he will later wipe off with money and he realizes.

 _Oh no_.

 

//

 

It’s a paparazzo. Of course it’s a fucking paparazzo. Will’s father is running for governor and he’s making a lot of noise, lately. He’s irreproachable—he’s a Beckett. They will find nothing on Frederick Beckett, not before he’s made it to the Oval. Everyone knows Will is at Harvard. Of course it’s a fucking paparazzo.

 

//

 

Harvard Square is beautiful in the fall. It’s beautiful always, but particularly in the fall, when it looks like the city is celebrating Harvard in its crimson dress, leafs falling and falling and falling. It’s chilly but still warm enough outside for people to be sitting everywhere, doing homework, having lattes, some smoking, some kissing in the open. Will is walking back from his Poli Sci 2125 lecture, and he feels light, he feels strong. He thinks of texting Artemis as soon as he’s seated in his next class. Maybe they can go out tonight. There’s something at the Club, but he’s exhausted and he doesn’t want to see the others. Clark keeps pushing him about his father’s electoral plan, and Amory is still trying to get him to drink fucking absinth. He needs a break.

 

He’s been thinking, lately, about coming out. Not publicly, not yet at least. But maybe he can talk sense into his parents; maybe they won’t hate him if he eases them into it little by little. He could always say he’s bi. His mother will not care, but Fred’s first worry would be about the Beckett legacy, so that would help. Gay marriage is legal now anyway, and tolerance is in. His dad needs the boost. Maybe they can orchestrate something. Will allows himself of dreaming about being the one to save his father’s career, of being happy and useful and still a Beckett. It’s a nice dream. He almost believes.

 

//

 

Artemis is yelling. Will can’t see, there’s too much red clouding his vision. The world is blurry and loud, and his hands are shaking. God, everything is so red.

 

//

 

The day before spring break, Will lets Artemis fuck him for the first time. He’s not averse to bottoming, not exactly, but there is a small voice still in his mind whispering to him that it’s dirty and perverted, so it always takes time and trust. Artemis almost falls over himself in his haste to undress when Will asks for it, blushing and shyer than usual. The atmosphere is strange and silent. For a split second Will thinks he sees reverence in Artemis’ dark eyes but it’s gone too soon to be certain. He shivers when Artemis kisses him, cold and exposed, but Artemis’ mouth and breath are hot, and his body is pliant and easy against Will’s. He makes a small noise when Will falls on the bed and takes him down with him, hovers over his lover, eyeing him hungrily. They only break apart enough to catch their breath, gasping, and then they meet again. Will mouths at Artemis’ smooth throat and whispers delirious encouragements in the crook of his neck, and it’s already so much, and he is burning. Their chests press together, skin on skin, and it’s a miracle of contrasts. Artemis is the sun. Will brings a hand around his neck and tugs, pulling him down on top of him. He sucks a bruise at the tender junction of his collarbone and his throat, and Artemis giggles before grabbing his wrists to hold him still, making Will moan loud and broken, surprised. Artemis kisses his open mouth, deep and wet, before reaching for the nightstand. He smiles victoriously when he blindly finds lube and a condom, tosses them on the expensive sheets and goes back to kiss Will quickly one last time before pushing him down flat on the bed and straddling him. Cursing under his breath, Will pushes his hips forward, seeking some kind of friction, anything. Artemis _tsk_ s him and pinches his left nipple in retaliation. Will closes his eyes and tosses his head back on one of the four pillows he always has in his bed, exhales slowly when he hears the characteristic click of a small bottle getting uncapped. He braces himself for the expected coolness but it never comes. Instead, when he opens his eyes back up again, Artemis is staring at him, his expression calculating.

“Can I try something?” he asks.

“Yeah,” Will says hoarsely, “anything you want.”

He guessed it the minute Artemis started looking at him like that, but it’s still a surprise when he lowers himself between Will’s legs and spreads his cheeks and just _goes for it_. He licks and licks until Will is a quivering mess, toes curling and knuckles white on the bedsheets. It feels like every nerve in his body is on fire. Artemis kisses the inside of his thigh and bites at it gently right after, and the gesture is so tender Will can’t breathe for a moment.

“Are you gonna _fucking touch me_ ,” he grits as soon as he gets his voice back, because he’s right on the edge and it’s killing him, pleasure coming in waves but not quite falling apart yet.

“Not where you want me to, no.” Artemis says, dead serious. “You can’t touch yourself either. It’s not gonna be necessary.”

Will hates how put together he sounds. His lips are red and slick, and there are purple bruises forming all around his collarbones and upper chest, but apart from that, he still looks untouched and unfazed, while Will is lying there feeling unmade and torn open with want and love. Finally, _finally_ , Artemis pours lube on his fingers and grins wickedly. The first one goes in easily, Will ready and easy and wet already, legs spread and accepting, almost begging for it. Artemis goes slow, careful, and Will is fairly certain he’s going to be driven insane.

“Jesus, Takano,” he protests, “am I going to turn fucking fifty over here?”

Artemis comes down on him so he can whisper in his ear, mouth sliding against his skin. “I’m going to go real slow on you, Beckett,” he purrs as he inserts a second finger. “I’m going to go real slow, because I need you ready. I’m going to fuck you so good, _Will_ , baby, you will feel me for days. You’ll go back home and you won’t say a word about me because you can’t but you will feel me with every move, and you will remember.” It’s filthy and delightful and Will full on _whines_ , pinned down under Artemis, exactly where he’s supposed to be.

“Shit, _fuck_ , Artemis.” He grabs at Artemis’ biceps blindly, scratching him, and kisses his nose, his chin, his lips. “Come on, fuck me. I want you, come on _._ ”

Maybe it’s Will endless cursing, or maybe Artemis just isn’t that good at waiting, but his self-control snaps. Will whines again at the loss of his fingers, feeling empty and cold, but then Artemis is _right there_ , and Will’s breath catches, and he has to bite his wrist because his moans are cries now. Artemis fucks into him unhurriedly, but he looks much less composed now. There is sweat collecting at his brow, glistening, and his teeth are digging into his bottom lip. Will finds himself mesmerized, watching, cataloguing the low sounds Artemis makes, the tiny changes in his breathing, the way his hands grasp at Will without really ever touching anything. He’s so enthralled in Artemis’ sight he forgets he wanted to stay silent and just lets his mouth fall open, the room filling with a symphony of small _Ah, ah_ s that he cannot keep from getting out. Artemis—beautiful, perfect Artemis—bends down to lap at the hollow of his throat, his cheek. Will arches up into him, hips bucking. He’s writhing now, so close it’s almost painful. Artemis must see it in his eyes because he angles himself just so and nails the spot inside Will that makes him see white for a whole ten seconds straight, and then Will is babbling incoherently, “Oh fuck, shit, Artemis. _Artemis_.” He comes just a few moments later all over his stomach and Artemis’ hand with a muted, broken moan.

Artemis falls forward, burying his face in Will’s neck, panting into his skin. Will turns and kisses his jaw clumsily, one, too, three times. “Artemis,” he says, and it’s all it takes for Artemis to shake apart and collapse on top of him, chest heaving, smiling drunkenly and satisfied.

 

They’re too exhausted to even clean up, and even if Will knows he will regret it in the morning, he cannot bring himself to care. He’s already dozing off when Artemis glues his chest to his back and kisses his shoulder sleepily. When he whispers _I love you_ , Will prefers to give in to slumber.

 

//

 

The flash doesn’t register immediately as such. It’s just a sudden light in his peripheral vision, like background noise, a nuisance. He’s getting sloppy, careless. _Artemis_ makes him reckless, drunk on a very specific kind of freedom. When the _click_ comes, he realizes. Light travels faster than sound.

He pushes Artemis off him, walks to the man hiding behind the small bushes of the Club’s garden with his camera.

“Did you just take our picture?” he asks, calm and icy. There’s a siren ringing in his head, getting louder and louder, deafening. “This is private property. You have no right to be here. Hand me the memory card.”

The paparazzo laughs in his face. “You’re crazy, gringo. This is gonna change my life.”

 _This is gonna change your life, Will_. He sees it clearly, his mother’s horrified silent scream when she’ll pick up the paper tomorrow, his father having to call in an urgent meeting for damage control. _Shit. Shit._

“If you want to talk to my lawyer,” Will says, and he doesn’t recognize his own voice, “I can give you his number.” He’s vaguely aware of Artemis standing right behind him, a steadying hand on his elbow. Will wants to shake him off but doesn’t.

“I’ll take my chances,” the paparazzo says, and retreats.

 

Will lunges at him, grabs a fistful of his ugly t-shirt. The camera falls on the ground, and he kicks it with all his might, sending it flying against the gate. It smashes into the metal with a very satisfying noise.

“Let me go!” the guy yells. Will swings at him. He hits him right in the jaw, and then again. And then again. And then he doesn’t even need to hold him up anymore, the dude just tumbles down and it’s easy to just fall too, get on his knees and keep hitting. He doesn’t know where this blind rage comes from. His knuckles sting and Artemis is shouting words he cannot quite figure out. Someone loops an arm around Will’s chest and tugs him back, hard and strong.

 

They sit him down on the porch, Amory crouching next to him. Artemis is kneeling in front of the photographer, his phone in one hand. _He’s calling an ambulance_ , Will realizes. Dread seizes him, cold and unforgiving.

“You were provoked,” Amory says. “You have four witnesses.”

There was no one but him and Artemis outside before a minute ago, they all came out because Artemis was screaming. But that’s what the Club is about, he supposes. He stares into the void, still seeing red. Artemis’ voice takes him out of his numbness. “Campus security is coming too,” he says, and his tone is indecipherable.

“He’ll come around,” Amory shrugs. Will thinks hazily that Amory doesn’t know Artemis at all. “Bro, if you needed someone to beat up, you should have told me.”

“I really was—” his words come out hoarse, raspy. “Provoked. I really was. I mean—I wouldn’t have. Not just like that.”

Amory gives him a long, pitiful glance. “I mean, just tell me. If you ever need to let some steam off, you feel me? You know how my dad, when he gets angry, he’s a fucking nightmare to be around? When it gets really bad, he just takes his car, no driver or any shit like that, and he goes to the bad part of town, you feel me? Gives a homeless guy three hundred bucks to let him take a few swings at him. Everybody wins.”

Will closes his eyes. His head is pounding. It takes him a few seconds to understand the sirens he’s hearing this time are real and not in his mind.

 

//

 

He tells his father he punched a photographer. Fred sounds tired on the phone, like this whole campaign thing is eating at him. Will suddenly feels small and young and lost, and he’d do anything for a hug or maybe even a gentle touch on his shoulder. He imagines telling his dad he needs him and for Fred to jump into the next airplane and come to Cambridge. He would, that’s the worse part. Will’s problem has never been neglect, not exactly. He doesn’t say anything. His father sighs and reminds him to never say anything without a lawyer.

 

//

 

They pay the guy off. It’s an outrageous amount of money, even by Will’s standards. He tells the police he doesn’t want to press charges. There are no photos left, so there’s nothing to blackmail Will with. His lawyer calls it a win. Will goes back to the Porc and Artemis’ door is still closed. He has rarely felt less of a winner.

 

//

 

“You think I care that you punched the guy?” Artemis laughs in disbelief. “I don’t give a shit, Jesus, Will. I mean, I’m glad he didn’t die. That’s always more trouble than it’s worth.”

Will threads a hand through his blonde hair. “Why the fuck won’t you speak to me, then?”

They’re in the living room, at a respectable distance from one another. They were instructed to be civil and talk it out. Apparently, they’re ruining everyone’s mood.

“Because it’s useless, Will. If you’re ready to face assault charges over the world knowing who you are, or if you’re that scared that it makes you crazy, I don’t want to be with someone like that. It’s not worth the bother. It’s only gonna hurt me, and you.”

It’s an unexpected blow. Will feels it low in his stomach, like a sucker punch. _I love you_ , he thinks inanely. _That has to be worth the bother_.

“Shit, Artemis,” he says instead, and he even musters the strength to chuckle. “You didn’t think we were—surely you didn’t think we were _together_ , man?”

Artemis freezes. For once, he’s at loss for words. Will wants to take it all back, to reach out and touch the ugly curve of his mouth with his fingertips, but the words keep spilling like it’s out of his control.

“You know what they say,” he says, and his voice doesn’t sound like his voice. “Girls for now, girls for later.”

 

//

 

**_Artemis Takano marries childhood friend Alice Malone._ **

 

//

**_Congressman W. Beckett found in compromising position with male escort._ **

****

//


End file.
